


A Regular Snow White...Kind of

by RadScavver



Series: Steve Harrington, Demogorgon-Whisperer [1]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Interspecies Awkwardness, Mental Link
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-18
Updated: 2020-01-19
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:13:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22297609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RadScavver/pseuds/RadScavver
Summary: Hawkins, Indiana. 1983. A missing child, a missing teen. There's something strange going on...and someone is more affected than they let on. Will it turn the tides of this story?
Relationships: Steve Harrington & Demogorgon (Stranger Things)
Series: Steve Harrington, Demogorgon-Whisperer [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1609186
Comments: 35
Kudos: 123





	1. Late Night Connection

**Author's Note:**

> This was a bit a strange idea, and I'm going to say that it was a little Dr. Dolittle inspired. I hope y'all enjoy.

Things were definitely strange in the fall of 1983. Not only the disappearance of Will Byers and Barb Holland, but the odd new relationship between Nancy and Jonathan. Mix in a pretty hefty dose of self-esteem issues, a few dashes of hype from friends who aren’t really much more than horny miscreants with the friendliness of rabid hyenas? It made for a hell of a time and a lot of regrets.

And god, does Steve regret.

His actions, his words, his fists. All swirling around and around and around in a downward spiral until he hated the sight of his battered face in the mirror. After all these years of being the “King of Hawkins,” what did it even matter at this point? What was it worth?

Was it worth seeing the absolute hurt in Nancy’s soulful eyes? Or the broken rage that had twisted Jonathan’s face, made every punch feel like a hammer on the nail of a coffin? Or the loss of everyone closest to him?

He couldn’t bear to look himself in the eye. And when he’d gone to apologize...when he’d hoped to God that Jonathan wouldn’t take one look at him and finish what Steve had started? He found another regret. One that he couldn’t even _share_ with anyone else, since it brought Barb’s disappearance into a whole new sickening light.

Because he’s standing outside the Byers house...and he can hear  _ it _ again.

He’d heard it before. Strange whispering sensations that came from seemingly nowhere earlier this year. He’d ignored them back then, figured he wasn’t sleeping enough or the partying was getting a bit too crazy. He’d started cutting back on drinking. But they hadn’t left. They’d started becoming more frequent, to the point where he would wake from a dead sleep because it sounded like someone was in  his  _ room _ . Anxiety had already been an old friend of his, but now it was starting to morph into paranoia.  He’d tried to just keep being normal.

The whispers had only become clearer.

Then he’d thrown a party...and Barb had vanished.

Steve had been too busy with Nancy, too focused on getting her to bed. Yet he’d still heard it. Curled in his ears, settled at the base of his skull. Felt like slime seeping into his spine. A zing of connection. And then he’d very clearly heard the rasp of a voice:

_ “FEED.” _

That one word had haunted him for days, tickling the corners of his mind like a song with words partially forgotten. The strange sense of familiarity to it felt like a sickness. How could it have been anything but his imagination?

Now, he’s outside Jonathan’s home.

_ “...d.” _

And he wants to beg for forgiveness.

_ “..eed.” _

Because he’s never wanted to be a monster.

_ “Feed.” _

He knocks on the door. He’s calling for Jonathan, trying to plead his reasoning already in case the other teen thinks the wrong thing. Trying to be louder than that  _ fucking _ voice.

Nancy opens the door. Her face is stern, and he’s never seen such fire in her eyes before. They’ve always been so very soft.

“Steve, listen to me, you need to leave-”

“No, I’m not,” the words are tripping over his tongue because she isn’t supposed to be here, “trying to start anything, okay?”

“I don’t care about that. You need to leave, and-”

“No, no, no, listen! I...I...I, I messed up, okay? I messed up. I messed...I messed up. Okay? Really, please, I’m trying to make things right. Okay? Please.  _ Please. _ ”

He’s not sure what draws his gaze to her hand, but suddenly the bandages wrapped around it practically glow against the door.

“W-Wait, what happened to your hand?” He can’t help how quickly his voice goes soft, gentling. He grabs her hand, feels himself go cold at the stain on her palm. “Is that blood?”

She’s yanking away from him. Steve feels like a snake’s bit him with the sting of her retreat. She nearly won’t look him in the eye as she tries to play it off. Says it was an accident. He can’t let her, though, not with the white hot fury sparking in his chest. Because the only other person who could be here is Jonathan; everyone knows Jonathan is odd. So, he pushes into the house. Demands an answer from him, a reason for the blood on Nancy’s hand. On  _ both _ their hands. His shouting grows and grows until Nancy cuts him off with little more than the click of a gun cocking.

_ “FEED.” _

The lights, so many many lights, flash and flicker. A sort of horrifying Christmas strobe display that makes his limbs tighten. But where can he run when he’s surrounded?

Then It comes from the ceiling. Hulking and glistening and growling, looming over them like Death’s ugly cousin, It is one of the most terrifying things Steve’s ever seen.

_ “F E E D.” _

Someone’s yanking him away. He follows after, and all he can say is “oh shit” like a prayer recitation. He leaps where he sees them leap, and tucks behind them because they’re both prepared with weapons in hand. They wait. Steve thinks he might throw up. When nothing happens, they creep back toward the living room. He notices the bear trap this time passing by. If it weren’t for the way Jonathan trembles, the haunted look on Nancy’s face, he would think maybe he’d lost his mind.

“This is crazy. This is crazy. This is crazy!” He laughs, yells, sobs.

He tries to call for help and Nancy rips the receiver from his hand.

“It’s going to come back!”

Her anger is a whip at his heels. It spurs him on, demands a decision. He runs for his car. The keys feel slick in his hands; his fingers can’t seem to listen to what he wants them to do. He gets the car door open. The lights are flickering again.

“ _ F E E D!” _

No one notices when he flings the door open. Not over the roars and the gunshots and the awful buzz of filaments being overworked. Jonathan is retching on the living room floor. His face is coated in some kind of thick glaze, but his bat is lying nearby. Steve grabs it before he can second guess himself. Nancy is screaming behind him, and the empty snap of the revolver trying to fire only makes Steve more desperate.

The first hit makes his bones rattle.

“Steve!”

He can’t focus on her, her fear, her surprise. All he can do is rely on the frantic primal instinct of survival crackling through him like a live wire. He can barely see, eyes dazzled by too many flashing bulbs, but it’s enough to catch the strange gleam of Its skin. Some lucky recklessness allows him to keep just out of reach of wicked looking claws. Let’s him get several good hits. The bat glides under his touch, rolls smooth across the back of his hand and fits firm in his palms. His swings are fluid. He vaguely wonders if this is what heroes feel like in stories. He wonders if they hear the same screaming that he does.

It tries to flee from him. Stumbles back down the hallway in the weirdest form of deja vu. When it hits the bear trap, he thinks they’ve won. Knows they’ve won. So, why-?

_ “P A I N! HURT HURT HURT HURT!” _

His stomach lurches. Jonathan is shoving past him, lighter flame a star in the pitch of the house. He remembers he’d smelled gasoline.

“Wait!” He’s howling, forcing Jonathan back. “Wait, just wait, okay?”

Apparently, it’s not just Nancy and Jonathan stunned by his shout. Otherworldly petals twitch and curl in his direction. It shifts in place, dancing on Its good foot and causing the trap to jingle. The chirps coming from It are...Steve would almost say fearful.

“E-Everybody just…” He lowers the bat, but doesn’t loosen his grip. “Hold on, for a second.”

“Steve, what the hell are you doing?” Nancy hisses. “We’ve got-”

“Nancy, please, just shut it, okay? Did you not hear it?”

Her eyes burn into his back. Jonathan’s suddenly very still at his side.

“What do you mean?” Jonathan’s voice is eerily calm.

Steve swallows, feels gravel in his throat. “You...you guys didn’t hear it talk?”

It’s hunching now. That great spindly-limbed form dropping down to all fours and yet It isn’t going for the trap. No, all Its attention is on  _ Steve _ .

“I heard it. It was screaming. How did you not-?”

Jonathan rests a hand lightly on Steve’s tensed arm, murmurs cautious in the dark, “Steve, it can’t talk.”

“B-But...it did.”

“Steve, with a head like that, it doesn’t even have a way to.”

Steve stares at that unsettling flower-like face. Watches the petals writhe, feels the prickle of the whispers scuttle inside his brain.

“It did.” He needs to know he’s not crazy. “You did, didn’t you?”

That monstrous thing freezes. Its eerie dirty grey skin looks as stone, wet from rain. He steps forward and It sways back. He knows without knowing how that Its afraid of the bat, terrified of the bite of nails in its belly. The knowledge is an ant crawling across his brain.

“How? How do I know you’re scared?” His voice is firm. He feels like he’s cracking apart inside. “How can I hear you and they can’t?”

_ “FEAR.” _

Anger is a shock. Static from too much friction. “I don’t care if you’re scared! You just tried to eat us!”

_ “FEED?” _

“Fuck you! No! We’re not food!”

Its head droops in reprimand. But the attention doesn’t sway. There’s a skitter behind Steve’s forehead; he brushes at his hair but his hand swipes at nothing. A tug in his belly feels like hope.

“Jesus Christ, it’s like trying to reason with a dog,” he huffs. “What the fuck am I doing? It’s not like I can just say ‘sit’ and-”

His words end with a click of his throat because It flops down. The strange legs are arranged awkwardly, from size and the bear trap, and the taloned hands are pressed flat to the gas-soaked carpet. Despite a sharp whine at the jostling of the wounded leg, Its head is perked.

“Holy shit,” Nancy breathes behind him.

_ “SIT.” _

It almost sounds proud. Steve blinks, lets the bat point to the floor.

“Uh...good job?”

There’s a surge somewhere between Steve’s ears that makes the hall spin. Too many bright colors race past his eyes, like the galaxy seen from a carnival ride. It makes him sway. Jonathan is a brace at his side, Nancy a support at his back, and It feints forward.

They jerk as a group only to pause as It swings back again and chitters rapidly.

_ “SIT. GOOD.” _

“Uh, guys?” Steve croaks.

Nancy whispers, voice shaky, “What, Steve?”

“I think I have an alien in my brain.”


	2. Friends on the Other Side

Steve and Jonathan are, very carefully, attempting to free Its leg. The bulbous head sways this way and that, watching them with a curiosity that dances spider-like near Steve’s nape. They’re making slight progress in wedging apart the spiked jaws. Soft clicks and chitters keep making them twitch, though.

“The kids!”

Nancy’s shout has all three jumping in place. Steve yelps and scrambles to keep his grip; the beast gives a small screech. Oily discomfort dribbles from the top of his brain.

“Jesus, fuck, Nance you can’t just _do_ that!” He feels sweat drip down his forehead.

She’s wild-eyed, too frantic to really listen to him. “We told them to stay at the school! But if we’ve got this thing trapped here, we’ve got to go get them!”

Jonathan’s hands are trembling. White-knuckled grip tight on slick metal jaws, eyes going wide enough for the whites to flash in the uncontrolled lighting, he doesn’t turn to look at her. But there’s no need to.

“Nance...you can’t drive.”

Steve swallows around a thick knot of worry. Between the three of them, Nancy is actually mostly useless in this scenario. She doesn’t have the physical strength to pry open the bloody bear trap. She can’t drive to go pick up the kids. She can’t keep the monster calm. Hell, she can’t even fight back against It now that the gun’s been lost in the chaos.

“Are the kids...safe? Like, are they actually good right now?” Steve asks in a rush. “Because I’m really hoping that you didn’t just leave the kids at school alone all day.”

The slick flesh stretches beneath his arm. For a second, he’s flashed back to summers as a kid and catching frogs in the creek near his grandma’s house. The gurgle that accompanies the movement makes something in his _bones_ shiver, though. A tingle under his jaw makes his teeth grit.

“Listen, you really have to stop with that. I can’t lose it because you won’t stay out of my head when there are _kids_ possibly in trouble, okay?”

He knows his voice is climbing. The hysteria is banked but it won’t be for long.

_“K...ID...SSSS?”_

An idea rockets through his brain, and It flinches back with a growl. Steve honestly thinks it’s karmic payback. But his idea doesn’t waver.

“Do you know what a kid is?”

Its neck bends, petaled mouth shuddering.

“Like...like us but smaller? Real shifty?”

Nancy barks at him, low and furious, “ _Steve-!_ ”

“You took one, right? You’re the one that took Will, aren’t you?”

It surges forward. Steve’s proud that he doesn’t retreat in the face of the absolutely nightmarish mouth flapping mere inches from his face.

_“WILL! WILL WILL WILL.”_

“Okay, you definitely recognize that word.” Creaking softly, the bear trap gives an extra inch of freedom under their hands. “You know Will?”

He ignores Jonathan’s sharp inhale. Can’t risk losing what tenuous understanding he’s found in this creature’s thoughts. The ache in his arms helps his calm.

_“FAST SMALL. QUICK RUN, HARD FIND. QUIET. KI...KIDS?”_

Steve breathes out slow and uneasy. “Yeah...yeah, that sounds about right.”

_“GOOD CATCH. STRONG CATCH.”_

There’s a sickening notion in his head that It means exactly what it sounds like. But, that’s almost exactly what he wants.

“You,” he sighs, a heavy gust out his nose, “uh, you want to be good, again?”

Talons patter against the floor, the limbs bunch and relax. He’ll take that as a yes. Squealing sharply, the trap finally gives and Its quick to bounce up. Jonathan falls back, crab walking away from the looming predator, but Steve stays. He stares up at a dripping mouth and far too many needle-like fangs. This is stupid. Probably the stupidest thing he’s ever done. But, with a steadying breath, he focuses on what he wants.

“Take me to Will.”

There’s, immediately, too much noise. Nancy and Jonathan are yelling, arguing even though they won’t come any closer to him. Not with how It’s already coiling one enormous paw around his waist. It hoists him up onto Its narrow back then launches them toward the wall.

He wants to throw up. A strange, slick feeling paints along his body; his skin and clothes are damp suddenly with sticky sickly-sweet _something_. It almost smells like the woods during the muggier autumns. Like tons and tons of old leaves rotting away but too much summer heat is trapped underneath, cooking the muck left behind until you can taste it in the back of your mouth. Hanging over the creature as he is, his already spinning head goes turbulent. Somehow he doesn’t throw up. No, instead, he fights to get his bearings. He braces himself enough to get his head up, to see where they’re at.

And...it’s Hawkins? Passing by at frightening speed, sure, but he recognizes the fields as they rush by. Knows the buildings they sprint past. Everything’s off, though. Too dark, everything bathed in the blue-black of new bruise, and so much colder than it should be. He wants to ask It what’s happened, but It jerks him away before he can. Stomach flipping angrily, he stumbles as his feet hit concrete. He braces himself against the biting metal of a lamppost. When he can see straight again, breathes in what feels like ash but tastes like mold, he wants to laugh.

“The library?” The white of the entrance glows like Nancy’s bandages from beneath a mess of black vines. “You took him to the _library_?”

It nudges him forward, eager little thumps with the back of it’s knuckles.

“Alright, yeah, why the hell not? Come on, let’s go.”

Steve leads the way inside, with the nine-foot murderous alien thumping along behind him like a duckling. Inside is almost pitch black, nearly impossible to see in. A few windows allow for some weak blue light, but it doesn’t reach more than a foot or so inside. The floor squelches with each step. He really doesn’t want to know why.

It’s a slow walk, and he’s not really sure how he’s going to find anything in here when he can’t even see his own hand in front of his face, but when It suddenly _chirps_ at him, he thinks they’re there.

_“WILL. HERE, HERE.”_

“Will’s here?” He asks, eyes darting left and right. “I can’t see him.”

It growls and clicks, shuffling behind him. Slick talons press gently into his back.

_“HERE!”_

He trips forward, into something wet and lumpy and rank with the scent of decay. Gagging against the odd glaze it leaves to his front, Steve shoves himself back.

“Oh my God, what the hell was-?”

Behind him, It shrieks; he’s suddenly pressed back into that disgusting wall. Only this time, he can _see_ what he’s touching. Nearly jaundiced fleshy material laced through with oozy black, and all of it glistens blindingly with disgusting mucus. Whimpering, Steve tries to fight for space, but the creature is pinning him and bellowing. It’s furious about something, maybe even frightened if the fire ants rushing around his brain are any hint.

“Hey, hey, you need to stop! Stop!”

“ _Harrington?_ ”

Steve freezes. There’s absolutely no way that he should be hearing Chief Hopper. It shouldn’t be possible.

“Kid, fuck, hold on!” Hopper yells.

“Get off of him!” Holy crap, that’s _Missus Byers_. “ You let him go!”

_“NO BOOM. NO HURT!”_

Steve screams, “Hop, don’t! It’s not hurting me!”

_“HURT!”_

“No, no, no hurt! I promise; you said you’d be good! Remember, good?”

_“GOOD. SIT?”_

“Right, sit! Sit is good!”

Rumbling warily, It shifts off of him. He’s left gasping in the glare of a flashlight. Turns his head to see the beast settling on Its haunches maybe a foot away from him.

Then Hopper is there, with Joyce Byers right behind him, and he nearly laughs at the ridiculous yellow suits they’re wearing.

“Harrington,” Hopper growls, nowhere near as frightening as he had been before this hellish night, “what the hell is going on?”

Steve glances at his new companion, then back at the pair of them. The garish outfits make him painfully aware of his own filthy clothes. How he lacks protection here. God, he just wants to go home, but he’s here for a reason.

“Um...good question, Chief. Really wish I had an answer for you, but my new, uh, friend here was just trying to be a good...um, alien,” Steve stammers, tries not to let nervous laughter build into the hysteria from earlier.

The look on Hopper’s face is a clear message that they’ll be having a much more in-depth conversation later on. Thankfully, Missus Byers is his saving grace because she wails her son’s name and reminds everyone why they’re in this bad acid trip version of their local library.


	3. Sometimes It Ends with a Whisper

Things are awkward, for lack of a better word. The three of them had quickly freed Will from his strange prison, but the alien had been absolutely  _ inconsolable _ all the while. It’s still sulking even now. Steve was worried at first, but then he’d stumbled over Barb’s  _ corpse _ and he’d nearly lost his mind. With Joyce and Hopper desperately trying to resuscitate Will, Steve had taken to huddling near the beast.

Maybe that’s why he’s the only one to notice. Or maybe it’s the way his gut cramps like he hasn’t eaten in days.

Those slobbering petals are spasming. Twitching, furling, spreading. The clicks are rolling from its throat. Its hands flex, kneading the air anxiously.

“Uh, you okay there?” Steve murmurs, inching himself away slightly. He vaguely hears Joyce’s sobs. They sound happy finally. “You’re kind of wiggly.”

_ “SMELL PREY. FEED.” _

“Whoa, easy there, what did I tell you? People aren’t food.”

_ “SMELL FIRST PREY. MANY, MANY. FEAR.” _

“I...okay, that’s a bad thing? Yeah?”

Hopper’s sudden bark has Steve jumping. “Kid, could you stop talking to that goddamn thing for a second?”

“Sorry, Chief, but Wiggles over here is saying something about smelling ‘first prey’ and I-”

“Son of a-! Joyce, grab Will, we gotta go.”

Said boy is watching Steve and the creature with enormous eyes, terrified and soaked to the bone in his mother’s arms. When It stands and begins to trot off, Will flinches. Hopper shoulders his rifle and starts after It.

Steve scrambles up, calling out, “Hop, what’s going on?”

“The people who brought this thing to Hawkins are probably its ‘first prey’, and they were after the kids.”

With a bitten back curse, Steve rushes past Hopper. He can just see the beast streaking down the street. It’s dingy hide is a flicker against the ever-night.

“Don’t hurt the kids!” Steve screams after It. “You hear? No hurting the kids!”

A thick hand wraps around his shoulder, scalding in the desolate cold. Hopper’s fingers flex.

“Can we trust that thing, kid?”

Steve’s breath fogs his vision. The creature vanishes with the cloud. Something brushes between his eyes, a stroke behind the bridge of his nose with just a taste of sharpness.

“The kids will be safe...but anyone else is fair game.”

*

The fall of 1983 came to a close, shrouded in lies and government conspiracy. Will was officially back from the dead; Barb was marked as a runaway. Some kind of agreement had been reached on Hopper’s behalf. Steve’s landline is bugged. He’s pretty sure anyone who’d been involved is in the same boat. There’d been all kinds of papers they’d had to sign, assurances that they weren’t going to blab about runaway “Russian” child criminals or alien monsters or the slaughter of dozens of government spooks. Not exactly par for the course in the Hawkins gossip circles, but hey, wine-tasting Tuesdays at the supermarket could get pretty crazy.

Somehow they’d all come to agree that Wiggles was not to be mentioned.

How would they have explained it, anyway? It’s not like they could’ve just walked up to one of the seemingly endless Suits-and-Sunglasses agents swarming Hawkins and casually mentioned anything. “Hey, that demonic alien from another realm? Turns out it’s more carnivorous baby duckling and attached itself to some high school kid!” Yeah, that would go over well.

At least It hadn’t ever called him “mom,” or something. Steve’s pretty sure he would’ve lost what little sanity he’d held on to. Hell, he’d nearly lost it when the kids had argued with him and told him the “demogorgon” couldn’t be named Wiggles.

He’d pointedly ignored that because it wasn’t like  _ they’d _ had to deal with its weird Star Trek mind-meld crap.

With a sigh, he shuffles deeper into the couch. It’s cold as usual, what with Christmas right around the corner, but he’s content enough with an old throw and an enormous sweater. The fireplace offers an aura of heat to help beat back the shadows. He’s playing one of his mom’s older jazz records to break some of the silence, too unnerved by the quiet after his stint in the “Upside Down” or whatever the kids called it. A lot of stuff makes him antsy now. Or maybe it’s because he didn’t really eat much today?

_ “FEED?” _

Sighing, he peeks over the back of the couch. Wiggles, in all Its eldritch glory, is staring up at him. Or as much as possible from where It’s buried in a veritable mountain of old linens. The mix of faded plaid and dusty rose look kind of cute...in a really disturbing kind of way. Maybe Steve’s already completely lost it.

“Didn’t you already eat a buck last night?” His eyes narrow in warning. “You did eat it, right? You didn’t leave it?”

Wiggles drops Its head with a rolling chirp. There may not be any eyes on that monstrous head, but he can still feel the way Its attention slinks away, slug-like from one ear to the other then gone.

_ “MANY PREY. MANY CATCH.” _

“Wiggles, I swear to God, if I hear about another mutilated deer in the woods-!”

The demogorgon grumbles and pushes Itself up to trot out of the living room, a train of old cotton dragging after it. He sees the sheet drop after a stray corner catches and tugs it loose. Wiggles clicks. There’s a prickle along Steve’s neck.

“Wiggles? Hey, don’t you ignore me! What’d you do with the deer? Wiggles!”

He hears the echoing  _ schlorp _ of Wiggles vanishing into the other world. Groaning helplessly, Steve shoves his hands into his hair and flops back down. It looks like he might have to give Hopper a warning call before bed.

**Author's Note:**

> I had a lot of fun writing this, and I'm really amazed by how many people have enjoyed this so far! I've already got other ideas planned out for this 'verse. Hope to see you then!


End file.
